Stitch It Back Together
by RiceForEveryone
Summary: "To his horror, the thread had completely unraveled the stitching connecting Mr. Mew's arm to his torso. ... He knew that lying to Shiki and repairing their friendship later would hurt less then telling her he was trying to stitch back her piggie's arm." post-game. hints of NekuXShiki. one-shot.


Disclamer: I don't own anything but the plot.

A/N: First fanfiction ever. Yay-eee! But I don't think it really turned out well. Ending seemed rushed. Oh well. Thank you for opening this. Enjoy!

Stitching It Back Together

~/~

"Crap! What're we going to do?"

"Waddaya mean 'we'? You're the one that ripped the thing!"

"Shut up, Beat! You were the one who suggested it!" Neku growled, running his hand through his spiky hair. The two boys were at Ramen Don's, panicking over the ripped off arm of Mr. Mew. Shiki had gone to the bathroom, and had entrusted Neku and Beat to babysit Mr. Mew. She had placed the cat plushie on the bar stool seat and left, leaving the two boys with her cat. Neku had reached out and attempted to pick up the cat so he could examine it, but saw that a thread from Mr. Mew had gotten caught on the metal rim of the stool.

Neku tried to gently untangle it, but the thread only got bunched together. He pulled slowly only to have the thread knot itself. By this point, Beat had stopped stuffing his face with noodles long enough to notice Neku's predicament. The two boys then tried many different approaches to untangling the thread, each bringing failure and a new wave of worry. After a few minutes of watching Neku try to untangle the knot, Beat had yelled at him to "just yank it off!" Neku was reluctant at first, scared that he would damage the cat that was precious to his closest friend, but after a failed attempt at trying to untangle the knot, just complied with his friend's request.

To his horror, the thread had completely unraveled the stitching connecting Mr. Mew's arm to his torso.

The two boys then began to argue over whose fault it was that Mr. Mew had lost a limb. "Hey, it ain't my fault you listened to me! Don't cha know better than that?" Beat retorted angrily.

"Okay, fine, whatever. We just need to make sure that Shiki doesn't see this," Neku said with a hint of panic in his voice. He was doing his best to keep a calm exterior, but he was freaking out on the inside. This cat was the sign of Shiki's debut as a seamstress, and it was her most prized work. It had even been her method of attack in the Reaper's Game! But now, here he lay, the mighty Mr. Mew bleeding out stuffing as Neku frantically thought of explanations for his crush's darling cat's arm being ripped off that she would accept without stabbing him to death with her sewing needles.

The two boys heard a girlish giggle followed by a, "What, no way! Eri, don't lie to me!" from the back of the restaurant and instantly paled.

"We are so de-"

"I ain't takin' any responsibility for this, yo!" Beat said instantly, scared for what Shiki might do. Neku, finally accepting that Beat was leaving him for dead, estimated he had about ten seconds to think up a solution.

"I got it!" Neku said quickly. "I'm going to take Mr. Mew home and-"

"Ah, no, man, you ain't gonna kidnap the cat, are you?" Beat interrupted.

"Yes, I am! Now shut up so I can explain!" Neku said hurriedly through clenched teeth, his patience wearing thin. "I'm going to take Mr. Mew and sew his arm back on. Tell Shiki that my parents called me for, um, a family thing. Say that I must've grabbed Mr. Mew by accident. Crap, she's coming! Here!" he slammed down some money on the table to pay for his share of the meal, quickly bid Beat goodbye, and left with Mr. Mew.

Shiki came back just in time to see the door swing shut. She snapped her cell phone shut and slid into her pocket as she sat down on the stool. "Where's Neku?" she asked as she looked around for him. "Did he go to the bathroom?"

"His 'rents called him for a family thing," Beat lied as Neku had told him to. Beat was a pretty bad liar, so he was proud to be able to pull through with this one, but Shiki saw through the faulty words.

"Beat," she began quietly, sadly remembering what Neku had told her before about his family, "you know as well as I do that Neku's parents are almost never home, let alone there to call him for some kind of family thing. Wait a minute, where's Mr. Mew?"

'Crap,' Beat thought. Beat just realized the mistake, and now he wasn't sure if he could hide the fact that Neku took Mr. Mew. "Um…" he began nervously, "I think Neku took 'im by accident…"

Shiki turned from looking under the table to Beat, her eyes slowly narrowing. "Are you lying to me?"

'Deep crap,' Beat thought.

~/~

Neku quietly sat on the wall behind Hachiko, his feet tapping against the wall to the beat of the music pouring from his headphones. His eyes scanned the crowd, looking for the short-haired brunette with glasses. She wouldn't be holding her piggie with her today like she usually did, he thought with a snicker. He pulled out his hand from his pocket and examined his fingers. Multiple bandages decorated his fingers and he knew that he had light bags under his eyes. He had stayed up for as long as possible to try and stitch up Mr. Mew, but he still hadn't finished. His sewing was bad and clumsy, and he ended up poking his fingers more than he poked the cloth. Shiki had called him out today to get Mr. Mew back, and he purposefully left him at home. He yawned, tiredly looking through the crowd once again.

"Neku!" a familiar voice called. He looked up to see Shiki waving and jogging towards where he sat, a smile on her face.

He hopped off the wall and a small, tired but genuine smile graced his features. He gave a small wave of his hand.

As she got closer, her smile slowly turned into a frown. When she finally reached him, she scrutinized him with worry and confusion. "Neku, what happened?" she asked, pulling his head phones off so that they hung around his neck ("I told you not to where these anymore! I feel like you're blocking me out when you wear them…") before taking his hand in her small ones as she poked at his bandages.

He blushed from her touch. "The pages on my math book are surprisingly sharp," he laughed. Unlike Beat, Neku knew how to properly tell a lie.

But Shiki knew Neku like the back of her hand. She had been stuck with him in the Reapers' Game and she had a crush on him, after all. He was always careful, always preventing himself or others from getting hurt. He only threw himself into harm's way if it was for the benefit of a friend. "Uh-huh," she replied under her breath, not believing what Neku had said. "Is that the reason for the bags under your eyes as well?"

"Yeah," he stated, hoping she hadn't caught on.

There was an awkward silence before Shiki said, "So, do you have Mr. Mew?"

Neku, springing into action, ran his hand through his air and sighed, "Awww, I forgot him at home! Dang it, Shiki, I'm sorry…" He pouted for good measure, but Shiki didn't buy it.

"What are you hiding from me?" she demanded. She crossed her arms and glared him down, successfully intimidating him although she was about a head shorter.

"What are you talking about?" Neku asked, taking the 'I'm innocent!' approach.

Shiki growled, "You're not careless enough to cut all of your fingers with a math book! And you certainly wouldn't forget Mr. Mew at home! The only who can get away with those excuses is Beat!" She huffed at him, her face red with anger.

Neku didn't have the heart to say that he had ripped off Mr. Mew's arm. He knew that lying to Shiki and repairing their friendship later would hurt less then telling her he was trying to stich back her piggie's arm. "Shiki, I'm not hiding anything!"

The two argued all throughout the time they spent together.

~/~

It was four days after Shiki and Neku's discussion at Hachiko, and Shiki had made it her personal mission to ignore Neku and avoid him. She was pissed at him for hiding something from her and constantly "forgetting" Mr. Mew. The only time she would talk to him would be at Hachiko where they would meet before school. She would ask if he had Mr. Mew, he would say no, and they would go their separate ways.

Neku was pissed that his sewing skills sucked and that Shiki was mad at him. Why couldn't she just let it go!? He was taking care of her piggie and was almost done repairing his arm. He was sure that he would be able to return it very soon. That is, if Shiki would talk to him more than once a day.

Their group of friends also noticed the change in Shiki and Neku. Whenever they went to hang out, Shiki would sit as far from Neku as possible. Neku would look hurt, but would quickly try and cover it up. Shiki and Neku would always flirt during outings, but now, they wouldn't even look each other in the eye. Beat had tried getting them to talk by telling them to just "make out and stop makin' everybody feel outta whack", and even though they both blushed, the two of them also shot him a death glare.

So here Neku was, sitting on his bed on a Friday night debating whether to call Shiki or not. Her contact was open on his screen, a picture of her smiling with her name and number under it staring back at him. His thumb drifted between the 'call' and 'end call' buttons, debating on whether to tell her to meet him tomorrow morning or to close the contact and wallow in self-despair. He ended up thinking about how Shiki would hate him forever and pressed the 'call' button.

"Hello?" Shiki said icily through the phone. Neku could feel her glare on the other end. "What do you want, Neku?"

He welled up his courage and said, "Hey, Shiki. Can you meet me tomorrow?" He didn't even need to say where; they always met up at their precious meeting place. Remembering how close they were when they made Hachiko their special spot gave Neku determination to get Shiki to forgive him.

"Why should I go? You're just going to forget Mr. Mew again!" she yelled through the phone.

"I know, I know. I'm sorry about the other times, but I placed your piggie in my bag already and-"

"He' s not a pig! He's a cat! Mr. Mew, not Mr. Oink!" Shiki explained for the millionth time.

" Yeah, whatever. Well, he's in my bag, and I promise I'll bring him." There was silence on the other end of the line and Neku became nervous.

He heard a breathy sigh before a small voice said, "Promise?"

Neku smiled to himself, glad that Shiki was still putting faith in him. "Yeah, I promise."

~/~

Shiki was already waiting at Hachiko when Neku arrived. There was a messenger bag slung over his shoulder, and she hoped that he had finally remembered.

"Hey," he greeted as he stopped in front of her.

"Do you have Mr. Mew?" she asked. It was the same question she had asked for the past five days.

Neku snickered. "Okay, don't say 'Hi, Neku' or 'Oh, I was waiting for you'. Nope, just get right to it," he joked. She glared at him and he gave her a small smile. "Yeah, I have in," he said gently. He reached into his bag and handed the plushie to his friend. The minute she saw him pull Mr. Mew out of the bag, her eyes had started lighting up. They sparkled like the stars when she noticed the cute red bow that Neku tied around his neck, but when her eyes laid on the ugly stitching on one of his arms, her expression turned worried. "I'm sorry, Shiki…" he began.

Shiki pulled on Mr. Mew's arm gently, watching the stitching as it stretched a bit before pulling Mr. Mew's arm to his torso. The stitching was horrible. The stitches were very visible, and they were ugly. There was no order or pattern, and there were tiny knots everywhere. "What happened?" she asked quietly.

Neku took a deep breath before telling her the truth. "At Ramen Don, his arm got ripped off because the stitching got stuck on a bar stool. I panicked and didn't want you to get mad or see your piggie this way, so I took him home. I didn't want to return Mr. Mew to you before I fixed him."

She was conflicted. Shiki wanted to slap Neku for lying to her(, calling Mr. Mew a piggie,) and stealing her precious Mr. Mew, but she also wanted to hug and kiss him for doing this for her. She settled for elbowing him in the stomach before throwing her arms around his neck while still holding onto Mr. Mew.

The blow to his stomach surprised him as much as it hurt, and he started coughing. Shiki pulled him into a hug and he coughed out, "Sh-Shiki?" He wrapped his arms around her waist and blushed. He had missed her and had hated being shunned by her. He rested his head against hers and allowed a smile onto her face.

"Idiot, you could've told me. I wouldn't mind stitching it back together. Especially since you're stitching sucks," she giggled. She sighed before continuing on in a smaller voice, "I was more upset that you lied to me. Geez, Neku, you know you can trust me."

"Yeah, I know. Sorry…" he apologized quietly. The two untangled from their hug and smiled. Each took one paw of Mr. Mew, swinging him between themselves as they walked off together to enjoy the day their friendship was renewed by horrible stitches.


End file.
